----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- trigger warning I end up walking past my old elementary school and middle school a lot when I go for walks. The elementary school isn't too bad for me, because they tore down the really beautiful 1920s building that I went to and replaced it with this metal one that looks like a tractor shed back in the early 1990s. They swapped where the playground and buildings were, so they could start construction on the new building while tearing down the old one. They wanted to close the school altogether, but a group of people got together and fought to keep the school open. My mother being one of the heads of that group. It was really important to her. She went there, all her kids went there...but you know what, now that I am older, I really think it was just a matter of her inability to change, to let things go, and part of her hoarding disorder. There are SO MANY elementary schools in this neighborhood. And there are a lot less families here than there used to be. I go past that school once in awhile when it's getting out for the day and it seems hardly anyone goes there. I don't know how necessary it really is. The middle school, though, I definitely sometimes get major PTSD when I go past that place. It is the same building. I told someone not long ago that I got used to being bullied all the time. And ever since I said that, I've been remembering how bad it really was for me. I tried to forget, I guess. I did get used to it. As much as anyone can get used to being abused. I couldn't change it, there was no one to defend me, and really it was often encouraged by people that were supposed to help. So I adapted. I got bullied every day in middle school. Every. single. day. They were relentless. Name calling, of course. But also physical assault. I remember once a group of girls shoved me down a flight of stairs. Luckily it was the sort where there is a landing and a turn before it goes all the way down, so it was about 15 steps and I landed against a wall on the landing instead of falling all the way down. I got punched in the head once. Really hard. People would put signs on my back during class that read the most disgusting things ever, and the teacher of course did absolutely nothing. That's just some highlights. It was really bad. I had a male teacher for English one year and French another year that was a pedophile, but smart enough to never actually touch me. Just say and do lots of other things that should have gotten him put into jail. When a girl is going through puberty, she definitely doesn't need sick fucker like that around to add to her problems. I had a female gym teacher that liked to single me out (and a few of my friends) and liked to encourage groups of girls to surround me and verbally and physically abuse me. She would stand there with her arms folded and just laugh. She finally did get fired half way through my 8th grade, so at least the last few months of middle school were a little better for me in that respect. Once we were doing something called "tinikling" and I was really good at it. It makes sense because in elementary school I was really good at dutch jump rope. The kind where two girls twirl the long ropes and a third (and sometimes a 4th) girl would jump in. For tinikling we used big PVC tubes because it was the poor school. But, me and a few others were great at it. So great the gym teacher wanted us to form a squad and go around doing demonstrations. It was the one and only time the gym teacher was nice to me. I was good at something, I participated, no one could make fun of me, and it was a nice change. We are all set to have a practice, and I was excited because I felt like maybe things were going to change for me. Then the teacher told me that it was off. She said that they other girls came up to her and said if I was going to be on on the squad then they wouldn't do it. I don't know if it was true, but that was shitty. Of course I was the only white girl on the squad, so maybe it was true. And that was not the first or last time I would be victim of reverse racism, either. Anyway, I had other teachers that would verbally abuse me. Humiliate me. Do things like push my back in and pull my hair so "fix my posture" so I wouldn't slouch and made sure I knew they were "doing me a favor for the future." The kids were the worst though. Every day. All day. They were truly relentless and I never, ever caught a break. And I can't count how many times things happened right in front of so called authority figures and they literally just turned around and walked away. I look back at all this shit, and I hope that with the new awareness of bullying that things like this are not allowed to happen any longer. And I look back at this and realize a few other things. Being treated like a POS by pretty much everyone except my immediate family made me not want children. I used to really wonder why all the other girls dreamed of having kids and I didn't. I thought maybe there was something hormonal wrong with me. But, it was just beaten out of me. I would never allow someone I loved to be treated the way I was treated, but they would be my kid, so the odds were, they'd have a shit time of it. I learned really young that people can be hideously cruel and so early on I decided I was never going to force someone to go through what I had to go through. I also realize now why I was eager to leave here. I took the first opportunity to get out of the state. The first person that was every really kind to me, I moved in with as soon as I graduated high school. We barely knew each other, but I didn't care. Anything was better than what I had experienced. Any amount of kindness would have been enough. Most of the time I pretty much have zero self esteem. It's very obvious to me. I work on it, but it seems like every time I make some advances, life shoves my face back in it. There are lines from a Nine Inch Nails song "Head Down" that go through my head at times like that "What you want / What you get / Know your place / Don't ever forget" Yeah well not the most eloquent words, but the whole song definitely gives off a vibe. We have to go past the middle school on the way to the nearest pharmacy or the coffee shop or the river...almost anywhere worth going to, really. I spent most of the last walk home reliving past traumas. It was like it just wouldn't stop until I had gone through all of middle school and partly into high school in my mind. It really wound me up and made me not so healthy inside my head. I was able to go to a different district high school, so I got a break from most of the people I went to middle school with. Yet, there were some people I already knew that had gone to elementary school with me. So, I guess it could have been worse. I did get a few death threats in high school. Honestly. People said they were going to kill me. I guess after all the horrible things I went through in middle school, death was nothing. No wonder I was depressed all the time. I romanticized death, hung out in graveyards, listened to goth and industrial music, and generally hated being alive. I still have my moments like that, but I have come a really long way from the person they all turned me into when I was a kid. I hope the few people in my life that know me IRL can see that. I think they can, and they call me scary because of it. I was anything but scary back then. I was scared. All the time. For good reason. So, the world can go fuck itself before I shoot it in its face. 1:31 PM - Monday, Apr. 25, 2022 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
||||||